Friday, February 27, 2009

Project 310 - The I in Team

Ya know, this season is kicking my ass from a caring perspective, so, as I plow through another episode, it’s time for some running commentary.

- Wow, Xander goes through another crappy job. I know he’s not in college, but so far this season, we've had bartending, food delivery, and now some kind of crappy energy bar salesman. Plus, in “Pangs”, we saw his brief foray into construction, which becomes his thing in Season 5

- This episode builds on the Spike groundwork from “Doomed” that will lead to the breakup in The Yoko Factor. Buffy ditches Willow and the gang for Riley and his gang, which definitely makes the Scoobies feel, well, less important.

- I'm not sure why the Scoobies helped Spike. They've got all the information they need about The Initiative from him (and anything else they need they can get from Riley) and he isn't really THAT helpful. In fact, it seems to just complicate things unnecessarily. Sure, he helped Giles, but that wasn't really his M.O. And he did it for money. Yes, Giles got his money back (or some of it), but wouldn’t it have been easier just to let Spike go.

- Following up on that, when the Scoobies flush the tracer, why does Riley immediately figure out that it’s been flushed. Given the scenario they’re following, and their knowledge of “subterrestrials”, wouldn’t it have been more likely that the “hostile” they were tracking was fleeing in the sewer? I mean, Riley’s a good soldier, but he’s not that good.

- I just don’t care about Buffy’s little near-death encounter. This whole Initiative plotline is crap, and the sooner it goes away, the better.

- Maggie Walsh is a bitch. She deserves her death, especially after that ridiculous monologue at the end. Talk about over-scripted. Damn.

- Hey, we’re 13 episodes into the season, and we finally see Adam. Sure, it’s only a brief moment at the end of the episode, but at least this season has a Big Bad, and only nine episodes left (technically eight, if you remember that the season finale doesn’t actually feature the Big Bad).